Date
by lucyhoneychurch
Summary: Chloe convinces Clark and Lois to do something....out of the ordinary.


**Title:** Date  
**Author:** Lucy Honeychurch  
**Rating:** PG  
**Disclaimer:** I Own Nothing  
**Summary: **Answer to Cat's DI Fanfiction Challenge #1.

**Date**

"Lois please."

"No."

Chloe shot her cousin a desperate look, "I've been waiting forever for Noah to ask me out and he finally did. Please?"

"Chloe," Lois glared at her cousin in irritation, "No."

"But Clark already agreed to it…."

Lois leaned back in her chair, crossing her arms, "Somehow I find that hard to believe."

Chloe tried to hold her sincere face but failed miserably. Lois had always been able to see through her. "Well alright," the blonde cringed, caught in her own lie. "He said he would if you would otherwise I was on my own."

"Which means no because I'm not doing it," Lois re-iterated.

"Lois," Chloe tried again, knowing that her cousin's resistance would wear down eventually. Deep down inside, under the exterior of negativity, she knew Lois wanted to help her.

At least she hoped so…

Lois drew a breath, blowing the air out of her mouth in frustration as her cousin prepared to mount another offensive. There was no way in hell that she was doing this but she feared she might be roped into it. Chloe had always been persuasive. Besides, the last time her cousin had had that look on her face, Lois had ended up impersonating a stripper...

"How many times have I done something for you?" Chloe continued, "And this is just one little, teensy-tiny favour."

"For the last time," Lois said, although Chloe thought she felt a hint of weakness in her response. "As much as I love you Chloe, I am not pretending to be Clark Kent's girlfriend so that you can get to go on a double date with some guy from your journalism classes. Even if the guy is the one you've liked since the beginning of the school year, you should still be secure enough to go out with him by yourself." She cleared her throat. "Besides that, even if we DID do it, Clark and I wouldn't be able to keep the act up. We don't exactly get along and the last time I checked, people who are dating each other generally do…."

"I don't know about that," a voice broke into the conversation that the cousins had been having at one of the tables at the Talon. "Lana and I didn't particularly like each other near the end of the year that we were dating."

Lois rolled her eyes, not having to turn around to know exactly who was standing over her shoulder. "Clark, to what do we owe the presence of your company this morning?"

Clark smirked lightly, pulling out one of the spare chairs at the table and sitting down. "Chloe asked me to come. I'm assuming she's trying to convince you to do this too?"

"Yeah," Lois commiserated, in a rare moment of agreement with the man she had once shared a house with, "She's insane…."

"But she's also still here," Chloe said pointedly, not enjoying being talked about as if she had suddenly disappeared from the table. "And she needs people to double date with because she thinks she's in love. Now are you two in, or not?"

"Chloe, you'll be fine on your own…." Clark sighed. He had already had this conversation, he was sure of it but somehow, here they were again…

"No I won't!" Chloe exclaimed in helpless frustration. "I've never felt this way about a guy in my life, and that includes you, Clark. I need back-up for this and I can't think of any two people better suited for the task than my best friend and my cousin. Please help me."

Clark shot Lois a look, feeling his resolve against anything that would cause Chloe discomfort getting the better of him. It was true that he really didn't want to do this but she was his friend.

Lois shot Clark a look of her own, knowing exactly what he was thinking and not liking one bit of it…"Smallville, don't you dare. You know as well as I do that this will never work."

He drew a breath, "I'm aware of that Lois but….what would be so bad about doing this for Chloe? It's not like it would be real or anything."

"Besides the fact that we hate each other?" Lois sighed heavily, feeling her walls of resolve weaken, shake and then finally crumble as Clark gave her his best this-is-the-right-thing-to-do look. She hated it when he did that…, "Alright, fine. I'll do it. But I'm not going to enjoy it."

"Yes!" Chloe cried excitedly, standing up from the table and moving to her cousin and then Clark, hugging them tightly before gathering her jacket and purse. "Thank you both so much. You can't imagine how much this means to me." She slipped the jacket on, all business now that she had gotten what she wanted, "We're going to dinner in Metropolis tomorrow so you both should drive up in the afternoon if you don't want to be late. I'll see you both at 7…."

And with that, she left the Talon practically skipping in excitement.

Lois turned to Clark, a thought having just occurred to her as she watched her cousin rush out of the Talon, "How did she know we'd say yes to this? I mean, she had to, otherwise she wouldn't have arranged this outing to be a double date."

Clark shrugged. He had thought of this too but chose to ignore it because he had no reason to believe that she would manipulate a situation involving a date between himself and her cousin. After all, Chloe knew that he and Lois would, at best, only be friends. "I don't know. Chloe tends to work in mysterious ways and I've stopped questioning her about it."

He cleared his throat, "I'll pick you up tomorrow about 1 then?"

Lois shook her head negatively, not wanting to get into the intricacies of her cousin with Clark right now, "No, earlier than that. We have some shopping to do first."

"Shopping?" he asked blankly.

Lois glowered at him, "Look Smallville, pretending is one thing. Making it believable is another. No boyfriend of mine would ever be seen in plaid-fictional or not and the last time I checked, your closet was full of the stuff."

"Fine," he sighed, not wanting to have the conversation in which Lois proclaimed him king of the fashion victims yet again, "I'll see you at 11 then? Or is that too late?"

"No, that's good."

And with that, Lois stood and grabbed her purse, moving towards the stairs that would lead her up to her apartment. "I'll see you at 11 AM tomorrow. Sharp."

Clark simply nodded, gathering up his coat and scarf and putting them on before heading out the door.

It was 5 minutes to 7 when they made it to the restaurant that Chloe had told them to meet her at.

"Where have you two been?" Chloe demanded in a shushed voice as they sat down, trying not to draw attention to herself in the crowded restaurant. She furrowed her eyebrow in confusion, taking in the sight of Clark in clothes the likes of which she had only seen him in once before-and he hadn't exactly been himself. Red Kryptonite had to be involved but she was unsure as to how Lois had gotten her hands on some on such short notice, "And how did you get Clark into those clothes? I haven't seen him dressed like that since that summer when he ran away from home…"

Lois turned suddenly appraising eyes on Clark, surveying him up and down from her seated position, "Smallville ran away from home?"

The man in question simply blushed, not wanting to get into it, "That's a long story."

Lois shrugged, smirking now that she knew she had something to get out of Clark. It was always fun extricating information from the farm boy and tonight's situation would only succeed in making the process more humorous. "We'll have time to talk about it over dinner."

Clark glared in Chloe's direction, "Thanks Chloe…"

"What?" The recipient of the hostile look said defensively. "I thought that conversation had come up at the Kent household during the several months that my cousin was living there."

"Well it didn't," he huffed, running a hand through his hair.

"Would you stop that?" Lois hissed. "You're making it look like you were stacking hay or something equally as farm related."

"So?"

"So you're playing a role tonight because I refuse to change to accommodate your supposed needs in a girlfriend, which, judging by Lana, are of the airhead variety," Lois explained, crossing her arms. "Therefore, you're the one that had to take on the role and that role is as my boyfriend."

"She's right," Chloe nodded her head, agreeing with her cousin. "Lois likes her men at least semi-coiffed."

"What about A.C?" Clark retorted indignantly. "He wasn't 'coiffed.'"

Lois shrugged, a dreamy look appearing on her face that, for reasons unknown to Clark, made him angry, "He was coiffed on the inside, which is more important I think. He had direction, purpose…he wanted to save the world." She seemed to come back to reality, "Besides, he was hot."

"So if I happened to want to save the world, it would be alright to have messy hair?" Clark said incredulously, not understanding in the least the logic that Lois was applying to this situation and not wanting to touch her last words. He had no inclination whatsoever to hear how attractive (or unattractive) she found him.

From beside the feuding couple, Chloe snorted. So much for worrying that they wouldn't be able to pull this off….if the fighting was any indication, tonight was going to be a breeze. She was interrupted from her thoughts as her date arrived, walking through the restaurant towards the table she had met Clark and Lois at.

"Sorry I'm late," Noah Wilson said, leaning over a bit to kiss Chloe on the cheek chastely.

"No problem," Chloe murmured, "We just got here too."

She looked at him, feeling the usual dazed expression drift onto her face before shaking herself, realizing that she had to introduce Noah to her cousin and her 'boyfriend.' "Noah, this is Lois, my cousin…."

"Nice to meet you," Lois said warmly, standing and stretching out a hand to shake his.

"And this is her boyfriend, Clark," Chloe continued, watching as Clark stood and shook hands with Noah, exchanging words quietly before sitting down at the table. She sighed.

Things were finally falling into place.

"So how did you and Clark meet?" Noah asked.

Chloe smiled. This is why she had decided that a double date would be so much better than the usually awkward dates she had been subjected to over the years. She and Noah had reached a natural lull in the conversation but where she faltered, Lois or Clark would help her pick it up again. Indeed, since they had all sat down at the table, the two of them had been playing a delicate game of showing practiced affection to the other with surprising success.

It appeared that they had found something that they were as good at as arguing.

Now, as they settled into the dessert and coffee portion of the evening, the show was quickly coming to an end.

Clark looked to Lois, watching as she smiled softly in mock remembrance and bracing himself for another of the quasi-sappy stories she had been telling all evening. Truth be told, she was the one carrying this off, not Clark-although he was certainly doing his share. The difference in their approaches lay in their sentiments towards the entire occasion. Lois was confrontational, and so had chosen to lay out all her cards on the table for Noah to see. Clark on the other hand, had been weaving stories to distort the truth all evening.

"We met in a cornfield," Lois' next words jerked him out of his musings and his eyes widened. He had a feeling she wasn't going to be making this story up…

"Lois…" he started in a vain attempt to stop her from telling this particular story.

"Oh come on Clark," she said, a mischievous look in her eyes. "It's not that embarrassing."

"Yeah Clark," Chloe shot him an equally mischievous look. She had never heard this story-neither Lois nor Clark had ever been willing to tell it to her in its entirety so she had picked up only bits and pieces of it. Something told her that she was going to finally get the unabridged version tonight. "Go ahead Lois."

"Well," Lois started, taking a sip of her coffee. "It was night, about 3 years ago, and I was driving to Smallville when suddenly, out of nowhere, a lightning bolt made contact with the field in front of me. I was so startled that I lost control of the car and went into the corn field."

She took a bite of the slice of cheesecake that she had ordered, chewing and swallowing before continuing, "I got out of the car to assess the damage and that was how Clark and I first met."

Noah looked confused, "How?"

"I'm getting to that," Lois continued the act, taking Clark's free hand with her own on top of the table and squeezing in 'affectionate' remembrance. "Do you want to continue Sweetie, or should I?"

"No, you're doing well enough," Clark said, trying his best not to drop the smile that he had been wearing for the last two hours it seemed. Indeed, Lois had been dropping pet names left right and centre while he had been forced to let her lest he ruin the charade that they were acting out for Chloe's date tonight. "Cupcake."

He felt like smiling now, as he watched a flicker of annoyance flash in Lois' eyes. In retaliation, he had been returning the favour all night and, judging from the continued expression of wonder on Noah's face, he got the feeling that Chloe's date thought that he and Lois were the perfect couple.

"Thank you," she said through gritted teeth, her own annoyance at the pet names that they had been calling each other barely being contained. She cleared her throat, continuing with the story, "In front of my car, in a heap on the ground, was Clark."

"How'd you end up there, Clark?" Noah asked.

Clark shrugged, "I didn't remember at the time. Still can't. Isn't that right, Hon?"

Lois had had enough but then again, she had always been impatient. It was one thing for her to use a pet name for Clark-that was fun- but she didn't enjoy it at all when he returned to sentiment, "Did I mention he was naked?"

Chloe's eyes widened, "NAKED? How the heck did you end up naked in a corn field, Clark?"

"I told you, I can't remember," Clark murmured, feeling a blush creep up his cheeks. Lois was going down for this one.

"Which seems to be a trend with Clark," Lois piped up again. "He's not very mentally stable sometimes. He lost his memory again about 6 months later."

"Wow, you should have that checked out…" Noah said. "It can't be healthy."

"And then there was the time that he…."

Clark finally broke, his anger overriding any need he had had to help Chloe, "How about we share some of your little 'mental' problems?" He turned to Noah and Chloe, "Lois spent some time as a stripper and since that time, she's behaved, well, _differently._"

"You promised you wouldn't say anything about that," Lois hissed, the act put to the wayside in her attempt to assert herself.

"Well you promised you wouldn't say anything about the cornfield," Clark argued, forgetting for a moment that Chloe and Noah were still there.

Lois' jaw set. Unlike Clark, she was still aware of her cousin's presence, "I'm sorry Chloe but Clark and I have to go. It was wonderful meeting you Noah…"

"Likewise," Noah said in a slightly scared voice, watching as Clark took his wallet out, set enough cash down on the table to cover his and Lois' tab and left the restaurant with Lois.

Noah turned to Chloe, "That was…interesting."

"Sorry," Chloe said apologetically. "They're very…."

"Passionate?" Noah injected. "Yeah, I noticed."

Chloe simply nodded, trying not to think about what was probably happening outside the restaurant.

"Were you trying to make me look like an idiot or is that just something you do naturally?" Clark asked in a furious voice as they walked back to the truck.

"No," Lois said defensively, "I was trying to make us look credible."

"Yes, because five million pet names for ones significant other is very believable," he continued to argue.

"Well it would have been," Lois inserted angrily, "Had you not insisted on returning the favour and then, during a very humorous story, decided to try to discredit me with an experience I would very much like to forget." She stopped as they reached the car, crossing her arms.

Clark didn't say anything to this, instead, opening the truck door for Lois before moving around to get into the truck. He settled into the driver's seat, starting the truck.

"Besides, you **did** lose your memory twice and you **are **mentally challenged," Lois settled back into her seat.

"Excuse me?" Clark retorted, stopping the truck and turning to Lois. "What did you just call me?"

She looked him straight in the eye, leaning towards him, "You heard me. I see no reason to repeat myself."

Clark leaned closer, eyes narrowing in anger, "Well, you're pushy and annoying."

"Pushy and annoying?" Lois raised an eyebrow, moving closer still to him in her eagerness for a good argument. Indeed, something had been off all evening and she was pretty sure she knew what it had been. She and Clark were both itching for a fight but circumstances had not allowed for it. Now, alone in the truck, they could…"I am not pushy and annoying. If anyone is, you are."

They paused in their words, chests heaving angrily as they reached a stalemate. And that was when the tension that had been building all evening broke and….

They kissed each other.

Wildly, passionately….a physical manifestation of all the bad things they had wanted to tell each other all evening, they kissed each other.

"This is wrong," Clark groaned into her mouth, panting slightly from lack of oxygen.

"Then why does it feel so right?" Lois said huskily, deepening the kiss and successfully beginning to change Clark's mind about the supposed wrongness of their current action.

They would worry about it later but for now, Lois was more concerned with ridding herself of all the pent up energy that had been growing since they entered the restaurant.

The consequences could wait until tomorrow.

Chloe turned to her date as they received the cheque and Noah brought out his credit card. Even after Chloe had argued that they should go dutch on dinner, he had insisted on paying. Noah Wilson, it seemed, was an old-fashioned kind of guy, "I'll be right back. I just want to see that Lois and Clark got back to the car alright."

Noah nodded, "Sure, I'll meet you outside then?"

Chloe smiled, dropping a light kiss down on his lips, "I'll look forward to it."

She stood, walking out of the dining room and picking up her jacket from the coat check before exiting the restaurant and looking around. Her brow furrowed as she noticed the Kent's truck parked down the street, unmoving.

She walked over to it, eyes widening as she took in the sight of her cousin and her best friend, making out in the front seat and smiled, backing away before they saw her and walking back to meet Noah outside the restaurant.

They could thank her for the privacy later.

**The End**


End file.
